10 Most Labor-Intensive Desserts

Amish friendship bread isn't that difficult to make, but the attention span required for this 10-day start-up may be more than some are willing to attempt.

The starter (yeast, sugar, milk) required to make this cinnamon sourdough bread is passed along from person to person much like a chain letter. Once you receive your starter, you begin the 10-day process of preparing the ingredients. Each day you perform a task -- stirring, adding other ingredients, waiting -- and at the end of the 10 days you finally get to bake and eat the bread. But that's not all -- on the 10th day you split your starter mixture, keeping a portion for yourself and passing along the other portions to friends, along with a nice little note explaining the process and the story.

The whole procedure harks back to the days when making fresh bread was a little more complicated than buying prepackaged ingredients and dumping them into a bread machine. So much for instant gratification!